


Season 4: Who I Am Now

by gibsy



Category: Stranger Things (TV 2016)
Genre: F/F, Harringrove, M/M, Slow Burn, WIP
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-11-06
Updated: 2020-04-20
Packaged: 2021-01-24 11:16:20
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 3
Words: 5,263
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21337354
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/gibsy/pseuds/gibsy
Summary: This fic takes place where season 3 leaves off. I have no idea where it is going besides to Harringrove heaven. Duffers, take note for season 4 please.
Relationships: Billy Hargrove/Steve Harrington, Robin Buckley/Heather Holloway
Comments: 5
Kudos: 41





	1. Chapter 1

“Flight attendants, prepare for landing.”

Billy jolted awake, stifling a scream he felt brewing in his gut. He’d been dreaming he’d never escaped the Mindflayer’s grasp, and that he’d been punching her, that he’d been hitting his own-

“Sir, please buckle your seatbelt, the plane has begun its descent.”

The flight attendant’s words snapped him back to reality as he began breathing normally again and buckled his seatbelt.

He still wasn’t really sure how he’d ended up here, away from the Russians and their base. Billy was still fuzzy on the details of how they’d gotten him from Starcourt mall; some dopey guard at the base’d said something about how his friends would assume he’d dissolved into goo like the rest of ‘em. Billy wasn’t sure if they’d all known about the goo thing, or who among the group at the mall would have counted him as his friend; no one had probably even shown up to his funeral. Maybe Neil would have gone just to pee on his grave, and maybe he would have made Susan and Max go, or maybe he would have kept them from going, he didn’t know. 

As the plane lurched forward and did that little bounce on the wheels that it always does (or, at least, Billy assumed it always did; this was only his second flight), Billy realized he had no idea what he was going to do now that he had landed in Indianapolis. He still had a couple bucks in his pocket left over from the wallet he’d stolen in Germany, but the majority of the money had been spent on two plane tickets, and what was left, once he’d converted it into US dollars in New York, was just shy of three bucks, not nearly enough for the astronomical cab fare that it would cost him to get back to Hawkins.

Billy figured he should call someone for a ride, but who? He didn’t have any real friends in Hawkins, and the only person that kinda liked him (“tolerated” was probably a more accurate word, Billy reckoned) was his sist- well, his step-sister Max. The guard had mentioned that she’d cried over his dead and gory body, and although Billy’d never admit it, when he heard that he’d cried too. Real silent, so none of the Russians could hear, but he’d cried real hard and all night long.

There was one big, glaringly obvious problem with calling Max- and that problem was named Neil. For the few months he was in Russia, Billy’d begrudgingly missed everything about Hawkins, with the one exception being his own father. He’d later make the claim that his old man beat on him more than the Russians did, even though he wasn’t entirely sure that was true, but he was sure that it hurt a lot more, being railed on by your own dad.

Billy found himself staring at the payphone mulling over whether it was wise to call his own house, but it was the only number he knew by heart, so he put his change in the slot and began dialing. He could feel his heartbeat quicken when the phone began ringing, and he licked his lips, which, for the first time in months, tasted more like the stale coffee from the plane than stale blood.

“Hello, Hargrove residence, this is Max speaking.”

What a little nerd. Billy hated himself for it, but he could feel a tear prickling in the corner of his eye and he bit down on his lip hard to stop it, bringing the old familiar taste of blood back to his mouth. He inadvertently breathed out a loud sigh of relief as he stabilized his breathing, and was suddenly struck by the thought that Max believed him to be dead; that she had thought this for months and probably would think this was a prank call or something and-

“...Billy?”

The timid voice on the line caught him by surprise, and he managed to choke out a reply.

“Hey, Max.”

A few moments elapsed of complete silence, and then it was as if Billy, with those two words, had unlocked something within Max. She grilled him on where he was, how he’d survived, and how he was doing, and before he got a chance to answer, he realized he needed to know one thing first.

“Uh, Max. Is Neil there?”

“Nope, he’s at work! Why?”

“Can you not tell him I’m... yanno... or Susan?”

There was some dead air between them, but for all her dumb teenage stupidity Max wasn’t that ignorant, and he could have sworn he heard her nod over the phone before she finally squeaked out a yes that made him feel more relief than he had when he’d boarded that train in Russia. 

“But where are you? How are you gonna get... well, where are you gonna go?”

To be honest, Billy hadn’t really thought that far. In fact, he’d barely formulated the plan to call Max by the time he’d picked up the payphone. 

“I’m at the airport in Indianapolis, and I uh... I was hoping maybe you could figure that out for me?”

Max took a whole three seconds to think before giving him a rundown of her plan to get Harrington to drive them the three hours to the airport. Billy thought he ought to turn that down; the idea of Harrington driving six hours round trip to pick up Billy, who’d beat him up and nearly killed his friends, made him nauseous, but he really had no other option, did he?

Max made sure Billy gave her the number to the payphone he was using, and then instructed him to stay put in case they needed to get in touch with him. When she finally hung up, Billy wasn’t sure she’d actually go to see Harrington, or if Harrington’d even agree to picking up Billy, but since he essentially had no other option, he used some of his remaining money to buy himself a Coke from the vending machine and slowly sat down, his back against the payphone.  
He wasn’t really sure how much time’d gone by; when he was in Russia he’d been away from any windows for months, and then he’d been traveling day and night for nearly a week, so he no longer felt confident in his ability to distinguish five minutes from five hours. But before he was able to have another nightmare about his part-time job as lackey to the Mindflayer, he found himself being wrapped in a tight embrace, so tight that when he opened his eyes all he could see was a tangled web of orange hair. For a minute, he forgot who he’d been when he’d been taken to Russia, and hugged the figure back, so tightly he was almost afraid he’d break her. He felt tears roll down his cheek, and he wasn’t sure if they were hers or his, but it didn’t really matter. He thought back to what the guard’d said, and if he wasn’t crying before, he was now. They stayed like this for what seemed like hours, and Billy reckoned he wouldn’t mind if they stayed like this for days; the thought crossed his mind that he hadn’t been hugged like this (or even at all, if he was being honest with himself) since his mother, and that’d been years ago. But all good things must come to an end, and suddenly he was aware that Max hadn’t come here alone; that Harrington’d be somewhere nearby probably snickering to himself about what a pussy Billy was being, and Billy snapped his hands away from Max’s back and stiffened himself up. Max broke the hug as well, and leaned back. Now that Billy could see past Max’s thick web of hair, he saw Harrington about twenty feet away, buying himself a Coke from the vending machine he’d visited earlier. He thought he saw him wipe a tear from his eye, but there was no way that King Steve felt any type of way about their little reunion or Billy’s triumphant return.

Harrington sauntered back over to Billy and Max, who were quietly conversing still on the floor next to the payphone. 

“So, uh, Hargrove... guess you’re alive then?”

Billy looked up at Harrington. Just a few months ago, he’d probably have had some snarky response planned, something mean to say to the tall boy with the even taller hair, but after the summer he’d had, something within him, the part that always protected him with anger and hatred, had softened somewhat, and all he could think to say was-

“Yeah... Thanks for picking me up. Long drive.”

Harrington looked him up and down, and although Billy’d figured there’d be anger in his eyes (he had beaten him up pretty bad) there was something else he couldn’t quite place- maybe pity? And then the three of them were walking (well, in Billy’s case, limping- he should really see someone about his leg) towards Harrington’s BMW.

For the first hour and a half, the ride home was effectively silent, with some pop music playing quietly on the radio. It was Harrington who finally broke the silence.

“So... I know we never really, yanno, got along or whatever... but if you need a place to stay you can stay with me. My parents are never really home, and even when they are I don’t know if they would even notice you there, they barely even notice me there.”

Billy hadn’t thought about where he was going beyond not going to his own house- and that was a big FUCK NO- so he appreciated the gesture. He was about to protest, since he knew Pretty Boy was just being nice and didn’t actually want him in his big beautiful house where a piece of shit like Billy just didn’t belong, when Max quickly interjected his thoughts by telling him she’d already brought all of the stuff Neil hadn’t thrown out yet to Steve’s. 

Billy would never admit it, but in that moment, he was grateful to have such an annoying step-sister.

When they finally got to Hawkins, it was nearly one in the morning. Steve first dropped off Max at the Hargrove residence (Billy slumped down in the front seat on the off chance that his father was awake and peering out of the window), and then drove them to his house, where all the lights were eerily out. 

“Yeah, my parents have been gone for a few days, and I left before it got dark, so...” Harrington said, as if reading Billy’s mind. Billy shrugged and grunted something of a response before he followed Steve into his house and up his stairs. Harrington showed him the bathroom and then the guest room, where he would be staying. Billy couldn’t imagine having an entire room in a house just for guests when they occasionally stay over. He guessed the furniture in this one room was worth more than all the furniture in his entire house combined.

Billy’s eyes quickly panned to a corner of the room, where a small pile of his belongings stood in a stark contrast to the bright, rich interior of the rest of the room. He was shocked Max had managed to salvage this much of his stuff; he’d figured long ago that Neil had thrown every reminder of his shit son away the day he’d supposedly died. But it seems that he still had some clothes, a couple records, and a photo album to his name. Although he might have been comforted by this, it felt strange- seeing even these nine or ten things reminded him of what felt like another lifetime, a Billy he didn’t recognize. Since he last wore that jean jacket, he’d been possessed by an otherworldly creature, stabbed through the chest by said creature, kidnapped by Russian spies, and spent a week traveling across Europe and America to get back to Hawkins. These items felt like relics from a different time, or maybe that they belonged to a different person who no longer existed.

“Uh, I’m going to go to bed, but feel free to use the shower or whatever...”

The voice snapped Billy back to reality as he placed his jacket back on the pile and realize another tear was rolling down his cheek. Billy gruffly mumbled an “okay” and roughly wiped the tear off his face. He stood up and brushed past Harrington on his way to the bathroom. The old Billy- well, let’s face it, the old Billy was dead now, and there was no use speculating on what his ungrateful ass would have done to Steve, but the new Billy just wanted to shower and sleep. And that is exactly what he did, the quiet snoring coming from the other room acting like a lullaby and the cool breeze rolling in from the window tucking him in.


	2. Chapter 2

Steve awoke around three in the morning from a dream. No, it wasn’t a nightmare, not like the nightmares he had been having every night since the summer, when he had gotten WAY too involved in more upside-down shit and Russian government conspiracies. Those nightmares woke Steve up in a cold sweat, heart beating fast and eyes wide, scanning the room for any residual monsters. This wasn’t a nightmare, this was an actual dream. 

It had been a nice dream too, albeit a little strange. Steve had been laying on the pavement of his driveway, looking up at the stars, when he heard a voice beside him counting.

“One, two, three, four...”

Steve looked to his right to see, of all people, Billy Fucking Hargrove lying beside him in the driveway. But this wasn’t the Billy he had known, the angry Billy who’d beaten him up and spent the summer possessed by an evil demonic entity- no, this Billy was soft. This Billy was still wearing a leather jacket, but underneath the jacket was a soft yellow T-shirt. This Billy was still scraped up, a little rough around the edges, hair wild and free, but the anger that usually manifested as a knot between his eyebrows was gone, and the anger seemed to be replaced by peace.

“Billy, why are you here, at MY house, counting the stars?” Steve inquired, although within the dream, even though he knew the situation was strange and unusual, he felt the peace that manifested on Billy’s face within himself as well.

“I could never see them before now...”

And before Steve could respond, he was woken up by someone shaking his shoulders violently. Steve guessed this may be even worse than waking up by nightmare, and his body reacted by sending out a fist before he’d even opened his eyes.

“Ow, fuck, jesus Steve it’s just me! What the fuck is wrong with you...”

Steve didn’t even have to open his eyes to know that it was Robin, but he did anyway and let his eyes adjust to the darkness and return a cold stare.

“You know, I could ask you the same question, sneaking into my fucking house and scaring the shit out of me” Steve hissed, his voice low but menacing nonetheless.

“Rich, coming from the boy who stood me up on our movie date tonight” Robin quipped, and before he could stop to think, Steve shushed her. Great. He had completely forgotten that he had agreed to take Robin to the movies to see Clue. Robin hadn’t shut up about it all week, and although she hadn’t explicitly said it out loud, Steve knew she really just wanted to go to chat it up with the concession stand girl. And he couldn’t even blame her; that chick was out-of-this-world hot.

“Why the fuck do I need to be quiet, I know you are home alone this weekend? 

And now, he was going to have to stray further from peaceful dreamland to explain the whole Billy situation to her.

“Can we go outside?”

“Its fucking December, you psychopath, why would we-”

“Robin. Can we please go outside? I’ll bring a blanket, okay?”

Robin begrudgingly mumbled her assent, and the two of them tip-toed out of Steve’s room, down his hallway, and down the stairs, stopping by the couch to stock up on pillows and blankets before braving the cold mid-December wind outside. It hadn’t snowed yet, but it was definitely on the horizon; the grass crunched beneath their feet, frozen stiff.

As if still in his dream, Steve automatically went to his driveway, set out a blanket and pillows, and laid down to look up at the stars, taking a moment to glance Robin’s way and raise an eyebrow. Although clearly confused and already dramatically shivering to convey her annoyance with the current situation, she obliged, and laid down next to him, covering them in about three layers of mismatched throw blankets. 

“Okay, Steve, not only did you ditch me on our movie date tonight, but now you are making me lay on your ice cube of a driveway with you at three in the morning? Are you having a stroke? Should I call an ambulance? Or are you the latest victim of the mindflayer? Or maybe the Russ-”

“ROBIN. Please.” Steve was rubbing his eyes, and Robin finally got the hint, sighed dramatically, and rolled onto her back to look up at the stars too. A few moments passed, and finally, Steve turned to face Robin, who turned to face him as well. 

“I don’t know how to tell you this without it being pretty goddamn shocking, but I guess after everything we’ve been through, you should probably expect the unexpected, right? Well... tonight I got a call from Max”

“Max, as in Billy’s sister? How is she doing after the whole, yanno, brother dying of supernatural causes thing?” Robin turned everything into a joke, and it wasn’t necessarily a bad thing. In fact, Steve knew it had probably been the thing that had helped them get past their trauma the most. But he could hear her voice crack, just a little bit, in a way it hadn’t in months, in a way only Steve would have picked up on. Robin was his best friend; he had had other friends, but he never knew what it was like to have someone trust you entirely, who you trusted entirely back. She knew him like no one else did, and he knew her in the same way. She had confided in him about Tammy and about who she was in a way that probably no one else in Hawkins would have accepted, and he had confided in her about, well, about everything. About all the shit that went down over the last two years, about how he hadn’t slept at all really in years, and now only had nightmares (although the nightmares had evolved over the years; one benefit of meeting a new monster every couple of months was, hey, at least the nightmares never got boring, Robin told him a couple of months ago that made him wheeze from laughing so hard).

“Yeah, Billy’s sister... well she- she got a call from the airport... it turns out, Billy never actually... he never actually died, Robin. Or if he did, he came back from the dead, I don’t even know. I don’t think Max even knows yet. She literally showed up at my house in hysterics, pounding on my door and screeching until I let her in. She brought a box of Billy’s shit, and then said that he had called her from the airport and we needed to pick him up, so we did, and now, well, Billy is asleep in my guest room, hence the talking outside.”

Steve realized he had barely stopped to breathe, and let out a comically large sigh. He was filled with such a wave of relief in just sharing this with Robin. And Robin, to her credit, took a beat before carefully reiterating what Steve had just said. 

“Wait... so Billy Hargrove, demon spawn of summer 1985, is currently asleep like 25 feet away from us in your house?”

“Uh... yeah, I guess you could put it that way.”

“I’m gonna assume that since you spent six hours in a car with him he has put his demon past behind him then? That he has retired from demoning and is now living off of demon pension?”

“Uh... yeah. He actually seems really... really beaten down. He mentioned something about Russia in th-”

Robin’s eyes flashed with intrigue. 

“Wait- did the Russians get him? I always assumed his body had just turned to goo and that’s why they hadn’t found it when they went back in to get it...”

“Robin, I honestly don’t know, and I honestly don’t even know if he is ever going to want to talk about it... But I kind of... I kind of feel bad for him now?”

Robin nodded solemnly. Steve loved that about Robin; behind her biting wit and ever-present sarcasm was a level of empathy he thought everyone should have. She always saw the potential others had, saw behind their masks and down deeper, deeper than he could, anyway. 

Robin asked a couple more questions, some of which Steve could answer and some of which he couldn’t, and at around 4:30 finally Robin headed home, on the promise that she could come by later and see Billy. Steve didn’t think it was a good idea, but Robin didn’t think that Steve was great at handling delicate social situations, and he couldn’t really effectively protest that very truthful statement. 

Steve crept back upstairs and crawled back into his bed, but he couldn’t really sleep at first. Although he felt a little bad for the boy, Billy coming back into the picture was troubling. Everyone had finally recovered; no evil or supernatural shit had happened in months, and Steve was finally getting used to a sense of normalcy. But Billy’s return could signify something bad. Maybe more gates to the Upside Down, maybe more Russians, maybe more Mindflayers or something even worse, like a Mindflayer 2.0. But eventually, Steve clocked in on the gentle breathing coming from his guest room, and sunk into an even deeper sleep than before.

When Steve opened his eyes, he was back on his driveway, and for a moment, he thought that perhaps he’d never gone back inside when Robin had come, except then he realized he wasn’t cold at all, and he looked to his side and saw Billy again. Only this time, Billy’s eyes were closed, and he was quietly but steadily breathing. Steve watched Billy’s chest rise and fall for a few moments, and again felt at peace, and looked back at the sky above, only this time, there were no stars anymore. He looked back at Billy, and suddenly, Billy’s entire body was covered in tiny specks of light. In stars. Steve stared at Billy, and began counting the stars, one, two, three, four...


	3. Chapter 3

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hey everyone! So yes it took me forever to update but I am planning on trying to update more frequently! Enjoy!

She couldn’t help it.

Steve had said she could come by at 6- that was when he got home from work- but she just couldn’t help it. 

Robin had tried to be patient, and usually, she was. She HAD to be. That was what it was like, being a queer in the small town of Hawkins. She always had to wait. She had to wait until graduation, until she could move out of this godforsaken town to a big city, maybe New York, maybe LA, she didn’t know, before she could be herself. Her and Steve had already made the plans; he was working, and living with his parents, so that he could save up money for the move. She was pulling extra shifts at the video store, and although she was definitely not going to have the same amount of money he was, they agreed to pool their savings and move the fuck out of there. 

She could see it now. A cozy, domestic life with Harrington, where she could truly be herself, and maybe even one day find a girlfriend... But that seemed so far away most days. So she was patient. Every time she saw Heather at the cinema, with her enchanting hair, her smooth skin, and her piercing eyes, she had to look away, and remember to be patient. Heather was a Hawkins girl, through and through. Her parents had met at Hawkins High, and she had spent her whole life in Hawkins, there was no chance in HELL she was also queer and would for one second go for a girl like Robin. So Robin had to remember patience, and that she was less than a year from moving out and hopefully getting to finally live her true life. 

But, for some reason, she had no patience at all when it came to seeing Billy Fucking Hargrove.

To be honest, she didn’t really know anything about him. She knew he had beaten the shit out of Harrington, she knew his reputation of constantly banging the hot chicks, and she knew that he had been possessed last summer, but she’d never really interacted with him. But she’d seen him.

She’d seen him in the hallways at school, and although others may have seen evil in his stares, Robin saw something else. Robin saw sadness.

She’d seen him at the pool in the summer, and although she had to dig her nails into her palm to keep herself from drooling over Heather, walking around in that red lifeguard suit with the shiny whistle bouncing between her... Billy never once glanced her way. There was a distance in his face when he was on duty, and although Steve has since chalked that up to be an obvious symptom of possession, Robin didn’t think so.

Even once, she’d seen him in his car by the edge of town. She would sometimes walk there, late at night, and sit on the ground and cry. Even though Steve was her best friend, the only person who truly knew her, knew who she was, who she liked, and how she thought, she’d never tell him how lonely she really felt, on those weekday nights, and how she needed to find somewhere in the dark, alone, to cry. He’d probably insist on coming with her, to protect her from the evils of the town, and if she was being honest with herself, it really was not a good idea for her to be out there alone, ESPECIALLY in Hawkins, Indiana of all places, but she needed it.

And on one of these lonely nights, when she was wiping the last of the tears from her face, she saw headlights and froze. It was Billy Hargrove’s car, she would have recognized that flashy hunk of metal anywhere. She scooted behind the tree she’d been sitting near and waited, eyes wide, as he parked his car. She could see him pull out a cigarette and light it, and she gasped when the flame from the lighter revealed the fresh shades of purple, blue, and red on his face.

She also saw tears, tears that felt different, and yet, not so different at all from her own. 

So although she had promised her very best friend that she would wait until 6, when he came home, to spy on his new roommate, she just couldn’t help it. 4 was close enough.

Robin looped around the back door- Steve always left it open, just for her, for when she needed a place to crash- and slowly slid the glass open. She didn’t know what she expected- maybe Billy sitting on the couch watching TV? Or maybe in the kitchen, making a sandwich? Honestly, Robin didn’t have a clue what Billy Hargrove did besides throw punches, get possessed, and cry in his car, so she really had no idea what she was walking into. But he didn’t seem to be downstairs at all. 

She quietly crept upstairs, carefully controlling her breathing, and headed to the guest room. This was a poorly thought out plan, she realized, as sneaking up on a known bully was bound to have terrible consequences, but it was too late, and before she knew it she was standing in the guest room, and Billy wasn’t there, but a pile of what she presumed to be his stuff was.

Her curiosity got the best of her. But this was Robin. If she could successfully sneak into a Russian fort (okay, they had eventually gotten caught, but the fact that they got in was impressive enough!) then she could successfully rifle through Billy’s things without him noticing.

She carefully lifted the worn jean jacket and sorted the contents below. A few albums- something by R.E.M, a Van Halen, and one she didn’t recognize the artist of- a photo album, and a notebook messily labeled “Math”. Robin picked up the album first, but before she could open it, Billy Hargrove was standing in the doorway, staring at her.

Robin froze. She wasn’t necessarily scared of him, but rather felt incredibly embarrassed to have been caught snooping like this.

Billy, in his towel with his mullet dripping onto his chest, seemed completely unphased by the scene. “Have I met you before?” Billy mumbled, before walking past her to sit on the bed. It was comical, this tall, muscular man sitting on pink floral sheets in his towel. But the moment still didn’t quite feel comical.

“Uh, no, I don’t think so? I’m Robin. Sorry I was, uh, snooping through your stuff...” She trailed off, and offered him a sweaty hand, which he ignored as he leaned over and grabbed his clothing and slid on a shirt.

Before Robin could think, Billy was up, towel on the ground, fully naked from the waist town. Robin’s eyes probably bugged out of her head, but before she could say anything, he was dressed and leaning against the frilly headboard of the bed. 

She looked at his face, and he looked at hers, and suddenly, he furrowed his brows. “I have seen you before, haven’t I” he said, and she could tell that he was wracking his brain to figure out where. Her recent close encounter with Billy’s junk had immediately been replaced in her brain with fear that somehow Billy Hargrove, who had been in god-knows-where Russia for months and was now lodging with her best friend, would somehow know all her secrets.

“Well, I used to go to the pool sometimes, and also I was in your class at school so maybe we had a class together” she said, but she didn’t feel that he was just trying to figure out where he had seen her.

“Ah, the pool... oh my god you’re-” Billy cut himself short. Robin couldn’t figure out why, maybe he was going to say something about how she was the girl Harrington was with, or the girl who could never get a tan, or the girl who everyone knew was queer because she looked at Heather so goddamn much. But Billy just took a deep breath in, looked at her and said “do you have any cigarettes?”

“Uhhhh, so don’t tell Harrington this, but I do... But I don’t think Steve would be too pleased with us smoking in his rich-boy house, so do you want to go for a walk or something?”

Billy nodded his assent, and the pair walked out the door, hands in their respective pockets, cigarettes hanging out of their mouths.


End file.
